Never Too Late
by SilverTurtle
Summary: It's near the end and Elphaba is thinking about the only person she's ever loved. AU. Gelphie. One shot. Little bit of book, musical, and movie, watch out now.


A/N: I was in a one-shot mood and 'Defying Gravity' was playing on my computer. I always thought there was something going on between the Wicked Witch and Glinda, then Gregory Maguire wrote Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West and added fuel to my slashy thoughts, and then _Wicked_ the musical came out and there was nothing for it. I had to write it. Elphaba and Glinda were so in love with each other, even my brother thought so and he only listened to one song ('What Is This Feeling'). Anyway, this popped out.

Disclaimer: I do not own _Wicked _(the book or the musical) or _The Wizard of Oz_ though I do own the movie, the book, and the soundtrack (I also saw the performance and spent a week squeeing afterward).

Warning: Femslash, duh, but also this is AU, read if you're still interested.

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Elphaba was thinking. Not so unusual a thing for her to do, what was unusual this time is what she was thinking about. And that was Glinda. Elphaba was thinking about Glinda.

Glinda the Good she was called now, while Elphaba herself had earned the moniker the Wicked Witch of the West. She wasn't wicked, she just thought differently than the rest of Oz. Glinda would understand that, she always had. Ever since they'd roomed together in college.

Oh sure, they'd hated each other at first. Well, Glinda had hated Elphaba anyway, but who wouldn't hate the person they were forced to room with after having their own room all their life? Elphaba hadn't hated Glinda, she'd thought her horribly shallow and disgustingly adorable, but otherwise she didn't have many thoughts about her at all.

That had changed when Galinda had started to listen to Elphaba, when she had become Glinda in honor of Dr. Dillamond. Elphaba had thought about Glinda a lot since then. She thought about her nearly all the time really. She couldn't help it. Glinda had proven to be frighteningly smart as well as hideously beautiful, and Elphaba was having a hard time reconciling the two. But just as she'd felt she'd come to some understanding about that Glinda threw her another curve ball in the form of friendship.

Elphaba had never had a friend before. The color of her skin, her bookish demeanor, and her rather aggressive laugh tended to keep other people at a distance. But Glinda had moved past that and befriended the reserved witch. Friendship had turned into best-friendship which had somehow morphed into love. A love so binding and all encompassing that it was painful. It pushed and pulled at them, it was intense and passionate and everything Elphaba never thought she'd ever experience. But she had experienced it, and she had liked it.

She'd had to leave. The Wizard was after her. But Glinda could get away, he wasn't after Glinda then. She had to leave to fight for what she believed in. She didn't want to leave Glinda, she loved the girl more than anything in the world, but Glinda hadn't been ready. For all her bravado Glinda was afraid, she had turned down Elphaba's plea, and Elphaba was glad she had. Glinda could never live the way Elphaba had to now. Glinda couldn't live if all of Oz hated her.

Elphaba wondered if Glinda ever thought of her, of their time together. Elphaba did all the time. She may have left, but she'd never fallen out of love with Glinda. She still loved the blonde as intensely as she ever did, with all her heart and soul (the only way she knew how), and wished her well. She couldn't even feel betrayed that Glinda was working with the Wizard, she must have her reasons, just as Elphaba had had her reasons to leave Glinda.

Still, she wished things could be different. She wished she'd never found out about the Wizard. Or maybe that Glinda had come with her, together they could have done anything. Or that she didn't feel so strongly for the Animals, that she hadn't decided to fight for them.

Really she just wished that none of this ridiculousness with Dorothy had happened. She didn't want to hurt the girl, she wouldn't ever, Glinda knew that. She just wanted those damn shoes! They were her last link to her father and sister, they belonged to her. She's the one that put the magic in them in the first place. But now the girl has them and the whole of Oz thinks she wants to kill the girl and that she's wicked and awful, but she isn't. She just wants her property back and the wizard exposed for the fraud he is. Not so much to ask really.

All of it had happened though, and now all of Oz is out to kill the Wicked Witch. She can just see the torches in her minds eye, burning on the horizon in the wake of Dorothy, her cohorts, and her little dog.

It wasn't fair. She'd almost had everything she could have ever wanted. She had an education, she had the love of a marvelous woman, and she was going to meet the Wizard! But it all had to go wrong, didn't it? Of course it had, nothing could go right for the green girl, she was destined to be awful, wasn't she?

"Elphaba?" Her name spoken in soft tones by the voice of someone she could never forget.

"Glinda. What are you doing here?" She strove not to betray herself by letting her voice crack, but damn if it didn't anyway.

"Elphaba, you have to run. Get away from here. They're after you." Elphaba felt a warm hand land on her left shoulder as Glinda joined her in staring out the window.

"I know they are. But where should I go? All of Oz knows who I am, I'm kind of hard to miss." She looked at Glinda with a sad little smile on her face. "No, I can't run. I have to face them here, whether I want to or not."

"Elphaba…what are you fighting for?" Elphaba saw pain in Glinda's eyes, pain and confusion, and she knew. She knew that Glinda still loved her, was afraid for her, and suddenly the world didn't seem as bleak as it had before.

"Nothing really. I'm fighting because the Wizard makes me. I can't-won't-join him and he can't let power like mine go unchecked. I'm a threat to him as I am."

"Is it too late?" Elphaba could see Glinda fighting back tears as she turned her head to stare out the tower window.

"Too late for what, my sweet?" Glinda's eyes returned to Elphaba's, her gaze penetrating.

"To be with you? To join you like I should have all that time ago? Is it too late for us? For me to love you the way I always should have?" Tears did fall now and Elphaba caught them with her thumbs. Smoothing them from Glinda's cheeks before they could leave a trail.

She gave Glinda a watery smile of her own, tears brimming in her eyes and escaping down her face. Elphaba bent to kiss Glinda, holding her close and trying to convey all the depths of her love for the blonde that had been denied all these long years. When she ended the kiss she told Glinda something she always hoped she'd get the chance to say.

"Never too late, my sweet. My love. I've just been waiting for you to make up your mind."

Glinda sobbed and threw herself into Elphaba's embrace once more. "Together we'll be unlimited. We'll fix everything, just like you always wanted Elphie."

"Yes, my sweet. We'll fix everything." And she kissed Glinda again, hoping the moment would never end.

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A/N: Leave a review, please.


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